(both pictures from the national archives of s'pore)
my friend's father used to operate a chinese wine shop in kallang, near to where the hatcheries - mentioned by chun see - were located. the shop was on the ground floor of a 3-storey building. it was just opposite the kallang gaswork.
some of the chinese wine sold in the shop was distilled locally by two main distributors - tan miang huat and chiang huat. the rest of the chinese wine was imported from china, mainly from xiamen. the liquor shop also sold beer, stout and a milder version of brandy. it seemed a special licence was needed if you wanted to sell whisky.
anyway, the chinese wine here does not refer to grape wine produced in china. it refers to chinese alcoholic beverages, including the traditional rice wine and distilled liquor made from grains and other ingredients. medicinal herbs and spices are added to some chinese wine. this type of wine will cost slightly more than the ordinary wine.
most of his customers were indian workers from the public work department (pwd) and the chinese workers from the many sawmills distributed around the kallang basin. that area then, besides having a river flowing through it, was also covered by swamps.
the indian customers would go for stout, sometimes with an egg added to the drink. some of them brought their own egg to the drinking place. most of the chinese workers would go for the chinese wine.
some of the more popular brands of locally distilled chinese wine were lau ah pek chiu (old man wine), ngoh kah phi and boo kui loh. these were cheaper and were priced at about $1.50 a bottle. there were also herbal wine imported for xiamen like choon seng tong and sze hock tong. these were pricier, at around $4.80 a bottle. the imported ngoh kah phi from china had a slightly higher alc
ohol content. another popular wine from china was the choo ee ching (bamboo wine).
the shop also catered to those who could not afford to pay for a whole bottle of wine. they could buy wine in a loose form, by the peck, either half a peck or one peck. there were also those who could afford but would consume just one peck - to give them the 'kick' - before they proceeded to the bars where they would drink more liquor and have fun with the bargirls.
quite a number of regular customers would get their fix on credit terms. they would drink first and pay when they got their wages. a small number of customers who owed a lot of money did not pay up at all. they just disappeared and did not go back to the shop.
his father's shop was open 7 days a week and the only day it was closed was on the first day of the lunar new year.
i was told by my friend that until recently there was still one or two such chinese wine shops in the jalan besar area.
when i was a young boy living in the upper dickson road area, i remembered seeing one of these chinese wine shops in the vicinity.
